As I mentioned yesterday in an update to my post "For The Record",  I submitted a question to FairTax.org's "Ask The Experts" page over a month ago, and never received any reply.

In an effort to be fair, I am assuming that they simply misplaced my original question, and I am submitting it again. Here is the question I asked:

How will you handle tax free sales by Indian reservations? As I understand it, our treaties do not allow us to impose the FairTax on Indian nations, but it will hurt competitors if Indian reservations have a huge price advantage.

I also submitted a second query:

Since tax payments are not monitored on an individual basis, what prevents anyone from creating bogus catering, home improvement, and other businesses and never paying any sales tax?

As I stated in posts elsewhere in my blog, I have a feeling that the "questions" listed on the "Ask the Experts" archives are actually made up by the site designers, and are not true user questions. They too clearly highlight areas the FairTax crowd thinks are strong points, or are easily answered objections. They also fit far too neatly on a single page, neither wasting space, nor running off the bottom.

However, I am willing to be proved wrong. So I am submitting both of these questions and will wait for a reply.

Come back to see if I get one THIS time. I will be posting updates as I either get a reply, or, more likely, as I continue to be ignored.

UPDATED 01/23/2008

I do not recall getting a response email last time, but I got one for each question this time and they are hilarious. I don't normally make light of poorly configured software, but the email I got was particularly bad. Here is the response email I received:

Thank you for taking the Ask the Expert survey. Your input is very valuable to us in designing our program.

<Delete or replace with a closing such as "Sincerely,">

<Delete or replace with an image of a signature>

<Delete or replace with a text representation of a signature (e.g. "John Smith"), the title corresponding to signature (e.g. "President"), and the site name>

Gives you a warm, cozy feeling doesn't it?

UPDATED 01/26/2008

Well, it has only been 3 days, so I expected no response, and so far have received none. However, I did get an email yesterday promoting Boortz's new book "answering" all the objections to the FairTax. (Great! Now I get to hear "read both books!" whenever I object to a feature of the FairTax scheme.)

I only mention this because it is exactly the same pattern as last time I submitted a question to the FairTax site. I never did receive a reply, but I started getting FairTax spam right away.

I am beginning to think "Ask the Experts" exists solely to generate a FairTax mailing list.

UPDATED 01/30/2008

It has now been one week, and still no reply from FairTax.org. I would like to think that the brilliance and complexity of my questions is such that they needed to consult all their most clever minds and will need weeks to answer, but I am a not quite megalomaniacal enough to believe that. It appears that once again, I will be receiving no reply.

Of course, should they reply, I will take back my criticism and admit I was wrong. On the other hand, should they continue to send no reply, I will post weekly updates, letting you know that as well.

At least until it becomes obvious that they have no intention of answering. Or I try sending a question again.

Yes, I believe in futile gestures enough to try one more time.

UPDATED 02/06/2008

It has been two weeks now, and still no response. Not even spam this week.

I am beginning to think that my second attempt to get questions answered by the FairTax "experts" is going to produce just as little as the first attempt.

I may yet be proven wrong, but I think the "Ask the Experts" page may not be what it claims. Either it exists solely to generate a FairTax mailing list, or it is just an excuse to post a few canned "expert" answers and give readers the impression that all reasonable complaints have been considered and shown invalid.

I have to say my confidence in the honesty of FairTax.org is not that great any longer.

UPDATED 02/15/2008

After 3 weeks, I received a second email from FairTax.org. Still no answer to my original two questions. This one is entitled "Help us raise $30,000 for a major FairTax media buy".

I feel after more than 3 weeks, I am completely justified in saying that FairTax.org DOES NOT answer questions posted on the "Ask the Experts" page, and that the page exists solely to build a mailing list for fair tax spam.

If anyone thinks I am wrong, show me proof that they EVER answered a question. These are the second and third questions I have sent, and NONE have ever been answered.

For a group which promises "fairness" they certainly are deceptive:

1. This lie on their web site
2. The "23%" tax that is really 30% by any sane definition
3. The promise that their massive tax will be magically "offset" by the end of "embedded taxes"
4. The claim we could have this "prebate" but "eliminate the IRS" (who would administer the prebate?)
5. The claim we would not need a massive bureaucracy to manage this sales tax (My home state has a massive bureaucracy to manage just a single state's sales tax, why would a federal sales tax not need one?)
6. The claim the tax is "voluntary" because "you can control how much you buy" (Newflash: Income taxes are voluntary then, because you can control how much you earn!)

Well, the list goes on and on...

I know politicians lie, but does every political movement have to be nothing but lies? You would hope they would at least TRY to appear honest.

Sadly, the FairTax movement seems to have no problem with deception.

UPDATED 03/08/2008

I give up.

I thought, finally, the FairTax.org people had decided to answer. I received an email saying something about an apology, and thought they had realized that they had not replied to any of the three questions I sent over the past few months.

Of course it was nothing of the kind. The apology was nothing but a (supposedly) clever come-on for fund raising.

So, I have finally concluded I was right in my initial assessment:

1. The FairTax.org "question archive" is a fiction, created by the site designers
2. Not one of those questions came from anyone outside of the FairTax.org staff
3. The form for submitting questions is nothing but a tool to generate a mailing list

So, I will not be sending any new questions to FairTax.org, nor will I be updating this any longer. The site is a fraud, which is what I should have expected. FairTax is based on several frauds, such as calling 30% 23% when it serves their purposes. So why should I expect liars to have an honest site?

I am done with them.